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Thursday, March 14, 2013

Day 2 of the OHL Cup Showcase Tournament presented by Visit Orlando
and hosted by the Greater Toronto Hockey League wrapped up at the
Hershey Centre in Mississauga, ON, Wednesday with 16 games played.
With all teams completing two games, just three remain with a perfect
2-0-0 record including the Barrie Jr. Colts, the Toronto Jr. Canadiens,
and the Elgin-Middlesex Chiefs. The Halton Hurricanes and York Simcoe
Express also remain unbeaten with records of 1-0-1.
The Chiefs' Travis Konecny leads the tournament through two days with six points including a goal and five assists.
Round-robin action continues Thursday with eight games on the schedule.

Game 19: Elgin-Middlesex Chiefs 5 (2-0-0) vs. TPH Thunder 2 (1-1-0)
By Rob Benneian
The Elgin Middlesex Chiefs scored their second big victory of the
day, defeating the TPH Thunder 5-2 after winning by a 6-1 margin over
the Southern Tier Admirals this morning.

The Chiefs were able to
rebound from an early one goal deficit with a five-goal outburst, led by
captain Travis Konecny’s goal and three assists. Lawson Crouse scored
twice for Elgin Middlesex and was named the first star of the match.

“The
team is really confident. We don’t want to get full of ourselves but
we’re feeling pretty good going into tomorrow’s game (against the Whitby
Wildcats),” said Chiefs forward Carson Brookshaw.

The Thunder’s
offence came entirely from forward Josh Wilkins, who scored twice. TPH
is now 1-1-0 after defeating the Wildcats earlier in the day.

Game 18: Halton Hurricanes 2 (1-0-1) vs. York Simcoe Express 2 (1-0-1)
By Rob Benneian
The Halton Hurricanes and York Simcoe Express battled to a 2-2 tie in a highly entertaining contest.

Chris
Klack opened the scoring for Hamilton when he undressed a defenceman
and roofed the puck over goaltender Marcus Semaio. The Hurricanes
increased their lead when Michael Andlauer scored for the third time on
the day, after a two-goal effort against Ottawa this morning.

But
the Express kick-started a late third period comeback when Sam Harding
fought off a checker long enough to sweep the puck past Hurricanes
goaltender Michael McNiven while falling to the ice. Minutes later,
Maurizio Collela let off a wrist shot on goal that McNiven got a big
chunk of, but squeezed past him into the net.

Overtime solved
nothing despite both teams having quality scoring chances, including on a
York Simcoe power play. Hurricanes forward Josh Dickinson beat Semaio
after being sprung on a breakaway by Matthew Kreis just after time
expired to end the extra session.

The tie left both teams feeling as if they had missed an opportunity.

“I’m
happy we got the point but I’m not happy with the outcome of the game,”
said Express head coach Thomas Milne. “Right now, we’re not matching
the intensity of the other team and we’re not working hard enough. We’re
struggling right now.”

Hurricanes head coach Kyle Russell said
blowing the lead would provide a character-building opportunity for his
squad and that his team would need to have a short memory to rebound for
their match early tomorrow morning with the Waterloo Wolves.

The
Express are set to take on the Ottawa Senators and will look to follow
the Hurricanes lead and become the second OMHA invite to knock off the
ODMHA champs.

The
Stars were unfazed by a first period goal by Elite’s Tiernan Seningen,
responding with two of their own from Matthew Caruso and Brody Brunet.
Jeremy Bracco scored his first of two in the game for Elite on a penalty
shot to tie the game again, but goals by Cameron Lizotte and Scott
Villeneuve gave NOHA a lead they would not surrender.

“We
rebounded with a goal and got the two goal lead back. I liked that,”
said Stars head coach Craig Duncanson. “The kids responded. They found a
way to get it.”

Blake Speers and Jason Uhl rounded out the scoring for the Stars, who are back at it tomorrow morning against Eastern Ontario.

Elite Hockey will be searching for their first win of the tournament against the undefeated Barrie Jr. Colts.

Game 16: Ottawa Senators 3 (1-1-0) vs. Waterloo Wolves 1 (0-2-0)
By Rob Benneian
The Ottawa Senators knew they needed to beat the Waterloo Wolves
after dropping their tournament opener against the Halton Hurricanes
this morning.

“We had decided this morning that if we couldn’t
win two games today we might be done for the whole week,” said Senators
head coach Gregg Kennedy. “It’s been our Achilles heel all year, we’re
terrible in game one of tournaments.”

Just as they did against
the Hurricanes, the Senators jumped out to an early first period lead.
This time, however, they managed to retake the lead when their opponent
tied the score and were able to hang on for a 3-1 victory.

Senators
forward Ian Johnston, who assisted on a late second period goal by
Costa Georgitsos, has been Ottawa’s most consistent forward through two
games according to Kennedy.

“Ian’s a kid who wants the puck all
the time and when he has the puck everyone in the building knows he has
the puck,” said Kennedy. “He can do some special things with it.”

Johnston
and the Senators will put their skill back on display tomorrow when
they take on the York Simcoe Express. Meanwhile, the Wolves will be
looking to get back on track with a win over the Hurricanes.

Game 15: Barrie Jr. Colts 4 (2-0-0) vs. Eastern Ontario Wild 1 (0-1-1)
By Ryan MetivierThe Barrie Colts improved their round-robin record to 2-0-0 after a convincing 4-1 victory over the Eastern Ontario Wild.
The Colts were led by a strong performance in net by Bradley vanSchubert, and a two-goal effort by JD Falconer.

“Our
goaltender was very solid for us when we needed him early in the game,”
said Colts’ head coach John MacArthur. “Early in the game we gave up
some odd man rushes and breakaways and he kept us in the game early.”

Despite
that early pressure by the Wild, Barrie was able to capitalize on a
first period power play goal by Rob Graham and another power play goal
in the second by Falconer, to hold a 2-0 lead midway through the second.
The Wild would answer back with a goal by Keegan Mulhearn to leave the
Wild only a goal down going into the third.

The third period saw
the Colts pull away though with Falconer’s second of the game and third
of the tournament with a goal at 6:37.

“He has a great shot, a
pro shot, with a quick release when he uses it,” said MacArthur. “It’s
nice to see him using defenders as screens to put some of those goals
in.”

Though MacArthur admitted his team was a bit sloppy to start the game, he said in the third they got back to playing their game.

“I
told them if we started looking after our own end we’d get our
opportunities to score,” he said. “In the third period we only gave up a
couple shots and we created a lot of scoring chances from looking after
our own end.”

The Eastern Ontario Wild didn’t give up though,
and were applying some late pressure to try and mount a comeback, but an
intercepted pass near the blueline by Matthew Baker of the Colts, led
to a breakaway pass to Lucas Smilsky who sealed it for Barrie, making it
4-1.

“We don’t want to let our highs get too high,” said
MacArthur. “We got the start we wanted in the tournament going 2-0. We
want to take that to tomorrow and keep competing and show we want to
keep winning in the round-robin and stay grounded so we can advance.”

The
Admirals lost earlier in the day to the Elgin Middlesex Chiefs and
needed a victory to stay competitive in a tough division. Davies scored
the game’s first two goals before Toronto’s Kyle Clarke denied him a bid
for a natural hat trick by beating Admirals goaltender Tymen Edelkoort
III on an odd-man rush.

Davies could not be stopped in this one,
however, as he picked up right where he left off 34 seconds after
Clarke’s goal to complete the hat trick. He would add his fourth and
final goal just under five minutes later.

“Even scoring four
goals, I did all the little things right,” Davies said. “It’s what you
do off the puck. Winning your battles in the corners and winning your
shifts. It feels good to show you can put the puck in the net.”

The
Red Wings countered with one of their own, but the Admirals closed out
the scoring with two late third period goals, including a pretty
deke-and-dish by Brady Cranwell to Jared Marino.

The victory
means the Admirals are, for the moment, tied with the Jr. Canadiens,
Chiefs and TPH Thunder for the division lead. The Chiefs and Thunder
will square off later tonight.

Game 13: Central Ontario Wolves 2 (1-1-0) vs. Oakville Rangers 1 (0-1-1)
By Mark McKelvie
The Central Ontario Wolves knocked off the Oakville Rangers 2-1 in a game that stunned many in attendance.
The Wolves trailed the Rangers 1-0 after Jesse Barwell scored a
powerplay goal 1:20 into the second period. The Wolves would tie things
up in one of the strangest ways possible.
A delayed penalty was coming up to the Wolves with a little less than
two minutes remaining in the second. The Rangers pulled their
goaltender Adrian Clarke for an extra attacker. The Rangers were passing
around in the Wolves zone when a pass back to the blue line missed its
target and went down the ice into the empty net. The odd goal gave new
life to the Wolves.
The two teams would go back and forth in the third with Clarke
standing tall in the Rangers cage, while Brett Chandler made some
outstanding saves for the Wolves.
With 3:07 seconds left, Nick Thomakos got a breakaway for the Wolves,
Thomakos fired a shot over the crossbar but the puck rebounded back in
front of the goal for Lucas Clark to fire home and give the Wolves a 2-1
lead.
Oakville came back with many chances in the last few minutes but
Chandler was steady turning back the Rangers to hold on for the 2-1
victory.
“We knew we had to keep their forwards to the outside and we got
great saves from Brett Chandler between the pipes.” said Wolves
defencemen and player of the game Josh Allan. “We played them (Oakville)
last weekend and tied them, so we felt comfortable going up against
them.”
Oakville has yet to pick up a victory after two games. Jesse Barwell,
the lone goal scorer for the Rangers, was named their player of the
game.Game Summary

Game 12: TPH Thunder 4 (1-0-0) vs. Whitby Wildcats 2 (1-1-0)
Mark McKelvie
The TPH Thunder scored three unanswered to defeat the Whitby Wildcats 4-2.
The Thunder were able to get on the board early thanks to Brendan Van Sweden who buried a powerplay marker 2:41 into the game.
William Scott answered back for Whitby to tie things up before the end of the first.
In the second period Whitby took the lead as Nathan Dion potted his
first of the tournament, but TPH didn’t take long to respond. Austin
Alger for the Thunder forced a turnover in the Whitby zone and walked in
roofing a quick snapshot to tie things up only ten seconds after Whitby
took the lead.
TPH then took the lead on a breakaway goal by Hayden Winch with less than two minutes remaining in the period.
The third started off the way the second ended with TPH picking up
another goal. Matt Goodman scored the insurance marker that sealed the
deal for a Thunder victory.
“We had a little bit of scouting report on them and who their go to
guys were,” said TPH head coach Paul Flache following the victory. “The
biggest point was to put pressure on them and that was our goal and it
worked out well for us.”
TPH goaltender Joe Bable was in goal for the win and took home player
of the game honours. For Whitby, Bryce Yetman was named player of the
game.Game Summary

Game 11: Toronto Jr. Canadiens 6 (2-0-0) vs. Thunder Bay Kings 1 (0-1-0)
By Rob Benneian
The Toronto Jr. Canadiens used a second period Thunder Bay Kings penalty spree to their advantage in a 6-1 victory.

The
Kings took six minor penalties in the middle frame and the Canadiens
cashed three times to build a 4-0 lead through two periods. In all,
Toronto scored on four of their seven power plays in the game. Canadiens
head coach Dave D’Ammizio said the team rolled the momentum of their
come-from-behind victory over the Central Ontario Wolves last night into
today’s contest.

“We’ve been working on the power play all year,
in particular the last practice prior to the tournament,” said
D’Ammizio. “If we’re working hard and drawing penalties with our speed
we need to execute. We showed patience and puck movement on the power
play which was nice to see for me.”

The Canadiens will look to
carry their strong play from the first two games into a tough match with
the OMHA champion Oakville Rangers, while the Thunder Bay Kings will
need a short memory as they face the Huron Perth Lakers in tonight’s
late game.

Game 10: York Simcoe Express 2 (1-0-0) vs. Mississauga Rebels 1 (1-1-0) OT
By Mark McKelvie
The York Simcoe Express pulled off a dramatic overtime win to get past the Mississauga Rebels 2-1.
The Rebels held the initial lead after Christian Rajic scored his
second of the tournament midway through the second period. That lead
would stand right until the final minute.
The Express got an offensive zone faceoff with less than 45 seconds
to go. With an extra attacker on the ice, the Express won the draw and
controlled the play. Maurizio Colella passed a puck into the slot that
ended up at the point. The point shot caught Rebels goalie Dalton Ewing,
the post and then finally sat behind Ewing for Colella to shovel into
the back of the net with 26 seconds remaining.
The two teams then headed to overtime, where another Express forward stepped up in the clutch.
Sam Harding got control of the puck breaking out into the neutral
zone and rushed down the right wing. Harding used his speed to cut
around a Rebels defender and then pulled the puck across to his backhand
to slide it past Ewing and give the Express a 2-1 overtime win.
“My teammate (Jonathan Yaremko) made a really good pass and I was
just heading up with speed,” said Harding after his overtime winner. “I
got around the defencemen and tucked it in.”
Harding says that his team had to dig deep to tie the game up in the third.
“We started off hard in the first but we kind of let off a little bit
in the second. We came out in the third knowing it was going to be
tough to get a goal but we worked really hard to get it.” said Harding.
Express goaltender Marcus Semiao made some key saves in the third to
keep his team in the game. Semiao was named the Express’ player of the
game while Ashur Elliot, who picked up an assist, was named the Rebels’
player of the game.Game SummaryGame 9: Toronto Marlboros 3 (1-1-0) vs. NOHA All-Stars 1 (0-1-0)
By Rob Benneian
The Toronto Marlboros knew they needed their big stars to shine brightest in order to beat the NOHA All-Stars.

They
did just that, as co-captains Dylan Strome , Mitchell Stephens and Ryan
Hunt scored in a 3-1 win. Strome and Hunt also added assists giving the
Marlboros big three a combined 5 points in the game.

“If we’re going to win, our big guys have to show up and play,” said Marlboros head coach Wayne Gagne.

The game was a must-win for the Marlboros, as they lost yesterday 4-3 to the Barrie Jr. Colts.

“It
was like the hockey Gods just didn’t want us to score (yesterday
against Barrie),” said Gagne. “You can’t lose (another) game. We have to
go six straight wins. That’s the message and they know it. Lose and
you’re out.”

NOHA had plenty of opportunities to try to even
things up, including on a five minute power play in the third period
after Mitchell Webb was given a major penalty and game misconduct for
boarding.

The Marlboros are now off until Thursday morning when
they will see Elite Hockey, while the Stars are scheduled to take on
Elite this evening.Game Summary

Game 8: Elite Hockey 2 (0-0-1) vs. Eastern Ontario Wild 2 (0-0-1)
By Mark McKelvie
Overtime couldn’t decide things between Eastern Ontario and the Elite Hockey Group as the teams played to a 2-2 tie.
The Elite Hockey Group, a team made up of various players from New
Jersey and surrounding states, jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the second
period with both goals coming off the stick of forward Jeremy Bracco.
Bracco was able to take full advantage of having teammates from his regular team joining him on Elite Hockey.
“I play with the two guys who gave me both passes and we’ve played together for a while,” said Bracco.
The lack of chemistry, between the team just put together, became evident in the third period.
Eastern Ontario got their first goal of the game off the stick of
Ethan Wensink at 3:07 and then Jeremy McFarlane put home a rebound only
18 seconds later to tie the game.
The two teams were unable to find the back of the net through the remainder of the third period and overtime.
Bracco said giving up the two goal lead in the third had a lot to do with the team having yet to establish chemistry together.
“We are from different teams all over and we are still trying to
learn each other’s first names, but hopefully it gets better as the
tournament goes on.” said Bracco.
Each team’s goaltender was named player of the game in the tie,
Jean-Pascal Sabourin for Eastern Ontario and Josh Sarlo for Elite
Hockey.Game SummaryGame 7: Halton Hurricanes 4 (1-0-0) vs. Ottawa Senators 3 (0-1-0)
By Rob Benneian
The Halton Hurricanes rode a four-goal outburst to a 4-3 victory over the ODMHA champion Ottawa Senators.

After
falling behind early on a goal by Costa Georgitsos, the Hurricanes
replied when Michael Andlauer tallied on a second period odd-man rush.
Chris Klack scored with a long wrist shot just minutes later. Andlauer
tipped in his second goal of the game 1:55 into the third period and
defenceman Mitchell Kreis slipped in from the point to slip one under
Senators goaltender Connor Hicks for the eventual game-winner.

The up-tempo style of game played into the Hurricanes hands against a stingy defensive team like the Senators.

“We
got the one (goal) and then the floodgates kinda opened from there,”
said Hurricanes head coach Kyle Russell. “It’s tough for any team when a
team plays defensively. It’s always hard to get the first one. Once we
get the first one, I feel it’s easier with our team to get the second
one, the third one.”

Ottawa made things interesting late when Brandon Zullo and Zach Senyshyn cashed in on rebounds.

They couldn’t complete the comeback, however, as Klack made a key shot block in the final minute to seal the win.

Both
teams will wrap up double-headers later today with Ottawa facing the
Waterloo Wolves, who lost yesterday to Mississauga, and Halton taking on
the York Simcoe Express.Game Summary

Game 6: Oakville Rangers 2 (0-0-1) vs. Huron Perth Lakers 2 (0-0-1)
By Mark McKelvie
The Huron Perth Lakers and Oakville Rangers skated to a 2-2 tie in OHL Cup action Wednesday morning.
The Oakville Rangers came into this year’s tournament as the top
ranked team in the OHL Cup Rankings but the Huron Perth Lakers didn’t
let that intimidate them one bit.
The Lakers came out with a very physical attack on the Rangers and
had most of the chances in the first period. Cullen Mercer was able to
convert in the final minute of the frame to get the Lakers on the board
as he roofed a backhand from the top of the crease.
The Rangers were able to tie things up four minutes into the second
when Andrew Burns scored from a bad angle. The Lakers would regain the
lead almost two minutes into the third as Ted Nichol was able to poke
the puck underneath Oakville goaltender Brendan McGlynn. Oakville would
answer with 6:36 remaining when Zack Dybowski slapped home a rebound off
a Jesse Barwell shot to tie the game 2-2.
Oakville captain Matt Spencer was assessed a checking from behind
minor and game misconduct with 2:29 left in the third, however, the
Lakers couldn’t convert on the powerplay and the game headed to
overtime.
In overtime, both teams had a few chances but the extra period solved nothing.
After the game, Lakers head coach Dave Schlitt was pleased with the
tie and said his team knew they had to be physical against the top
ranked Rangers squad.
“They've got guys that can really move the puck, so we wanted to take
away time and space and come out and be aggressive.” said Schlitt.
Huron Perth’s goaltender Ben Lander stood tall in the goal late in the game as the Rangers turned up the pressure.
“I was really pleased with Ben’s game,” said Schlitt. “He made some key saves especially late in the game and kept us in it.”
Lander’s counterpart Brendan McGlynn was awarded player of the game
for the Rangers while Ted Nichol took home the honours for the Lakers.Game Summary

The Admirals were able to stay within striking distance
for most of the first two periods but a late second period goal by
first star Drew Worrad pushed the Chiefs lead to three goals.

“The kids started rolling after the second and we came out and we took control from there,” said Chiefs head coach Darren Kelly.

Worrad
opened the scoring just over a minute into the game and assisted on the
last of three Chiefs third period goals. Elgin Middlesex captain Travis
Konecny added two helpers and 10 Chiefs skaters hit the score sheet.

“Our
depth and keeping it simple (were the difference),” Kelly said. “We
have three solid forward lines. If they try and match our top line, the
other two lines can do the damage.”

Admirals forward Colin Elder scored the lone Southern Tier goal and was named his club's Player of the Game.

Both
teams next opponent is USA invite TPH Thunder, with the Chiefs
completing their Wednesday double-header in tonight’s late game and the
Admirals taking them on Thursday afternoon.Game Summary